Disposable Heroes
by Sue Pokorny
Summary: Tag to S2 ep Playthings. Basically because it ticked me off.


**I wrote this a while ago simply because parts of Playthings kinda ticked me off. Of course, that's just me. And I could be way off base, but it made me feel better, so I figured I'd finally post it just to get it out of my hardrive. g **

**Now I'm happy.**

**Disposable Heroes**

The hum of the Impala's engine was the only noise as they sped down the two-lane highway. They hadn't passed another vehicle for the last twenty minutes, and Sam was beginning to wonder if they had somehow slipped into a silent, empty dimension when he wasn't looking. He glanced to his left, noting his brother's white knuckled grip on the steering wheel. Dean was staring from under lowered brows at the road in front of them, his jaw twitching, a tick that only occurred when he was either very tired, very annoyed or very pissed.

Sam was pretty sure he was pissed.

"You've been quiet." Sam offered an olive branch, hoping to start the conversation he knew was imminent. He felt guilty as hell for forcing Dean to make that promise, but he couldn't bring himself to actually regret it.

Dean glanced in his direction, but quickly looked back toward the road without bothering to comment.

Okay, Sam amended, his brother was very, very pissed.

"Look, Dean, I'm sorry –"

"Don't, Sam."

Sam stared at his brother's profile, not at all comfortable with the low growl that was Dean's voice.

"Dean…" he tried only to be cut off again.

"I said don't." Dean didn't avert his eyes from the road, but his grip on the steering wheel tightened.

Sam sighed. He really wanted to get this out in the open. He couldn't stand the silence. There was enough crap floating around in his head right now, he would really like to know that Dean understood where he was coming from and why he had to ask him to make a promise they both knew was the last thing either of them really wanted.

"Dean, man, come on. I really want to explain…"

"I don't care, Sam."

That wasn't exactly what he was expecting. "What?"

Dean finally turned to look at him and Sam's breath caught at the look of complete despair in his brother's eyes.

"I mean it, Sam." Dean's voice had lost the edgy growl and was now slightly more than a whisper. He turned his gaze back to the road and swallowed hard. "I don't care what your reasons are. I don't care what's going on in that egghead brain of yours. I don't care about your fears or your dreams or your guilt. I just don't care anymore."

The silence almost suffocated him as he stared at his brother. He opened his mouth to respond, but Dean wasn't finished.

"You and Dad, you're just carbon copies of each other, you know? You're both so wrapped up in your own selfish drama, in your damn war with this fucking demon, that you can't or won't see what you're doing to anyone else."

Sam finally found his voice. "Dean, this is your fight, too."

Dean's laugh held no humor. "No. It's not. It never was."

"How can you say that? You're the one who followed every order Dad gave. You're the one who never questioned anything he did. How can you say this isn't your fight as much as ours?"

"Because killing this demon was never my war, Sam. Keeping you safe, keeping Dad safe, that was my fight. You want to know why I was so eager to go on hunts with Dad? To keep him alive. You don't remember what he was like when he hunted alone, when he came home after killing whatever evil son-of-a-bitch he was after. I just thought that if I was with him, if I could help him, maybe…."

"Maybe what?"

Dean shrugged. "Maybe I could take some of the hatred away. Maybe I could find the dad I used to know."

Sam held his breath. He knew that Dean had always been gung ho about the hunting. He'd always assumed it was because that was what he wanted – that his motives were the same as Dad's. Could he have been that wrong?

Dean's voice had dropped in pitch again. Sam could tell he was still angry, but there was something else that Sam wasn't used to hearing in his brother's voice. Something he couldn't really bring himself to identify. Something that sounded too much like defeat.

"All my life, I did everything I could to make you and Dad happy, to make our family work. But you were both so hell bent on getting your own points across, that neither one of you ever took the time to listen. You never bothered to see what your actions were doing to each other."

_Or to me._ Sam could almost hear the omission.

"I gave you everything I had in the hopes that one of you would just step back and see what you were doing, but…" Dean shook his head. "I would've done anything to make you realize that we had everything we needed – that normal wasn't gonna give you anything more than what you already had. Or to make him realize that there was more than just that damn demon. That it didn't matter if we ever killed it 'cause it'd already won. All I ever wanted was for us to be a family. But that damned thing took it away and Dad let it." He finally looked over at Sam, and he was shocked to see the single tear track down Dean's cheek.

"Dean…"

His brother just shook his head sadly. "So I don't care why you made me make that promise, Sam. I don't care why Dad told me that I may have to kill you. I just don't freakin' care. 'Cause neither one of you ever stopped to think that what you wanted may not be what I wanted. May not even come close."

Before Sam could formulate a response, Dean leaned over and turned the volume knob on the radio, filling the car with the driving beat of AC/DC, and effectively cutting off the conversation. He swallowed the lump in his throat and turned his face to the window, his eyes fixed on his brother's reflection in the glass.

Dean was right. Sam should have never made him promise. But it was done, and there was no way to take it back now. Sam just hoped it would never come to that, and he made himself a promise to do whatever it took to keep his big brother from having to fulfill his.

End


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